Broken Dreams
by Catslynw
Summary: AU during 5-18, Point of No Return, based on 5-17 and promos for 5-18, written before that ep aired, no Adam in this story. Dean is ready to say yes to Michael. Cas and Lisa Braeden take steps to make him change his mind. Definite ship, slash friendly
1. Chapter 1

Broken Dreams

*Author's note: This is set partway through episode 5-18, Point of No Return. It was based on the events of ep 5-17, 99 Problems, and the three clips of 5-18 that could be found on prior to the ep airing. In this AU version, Adam was not resurrected and does not appear. Based on the 5-18 promos and clips, the events preceding this story are as follows: Dean goes in search of Michael. He is tracked down and brought home by Sam and Cas. Dean escapes, visits Lisa and is subsequently captured by Cas again -- the infamous beatdown.

Castiel had been standing by the panic room door for hours, not speaking, not attempting to exhort Dean to change his mind, simply… standing. He found he was calmer here, near Dean. Bobby and Sam were upstairs continuing their research and for a while Castiel had attempted to assist them, but he could not focus, and research of the sort they engaged in was not really his area. He was soldier. That and only that. He had been a soldier of Heaven, a soldier of God. Now he was an expatriate with no home to call his own, no allegiance to God, king or country. He had but one cause left, one thing he still believed in, one man for whom he had given everything and for whom he would yet give more. Dean Winchester. It comforted him to be here, close to Dean, knowing that he would hear instantly if Dean needed him. Knowing that Dean would not be able to slip his prison and escape them – yet again – while Castiel stood watch. Dean would not be able to throw his life, his free will and his very soul away by saying yes to Michael. It would not happen. It must not happen. Let the world burn. Let them all perish. But by the God who had forsaken them, Castiel would never allow Dean to destroy himself thus. Fate and destiny be damned.

So he stood his silent watch alone and thought.

Many things troubled him. Many doubts filled him with apprehension for the coming end of days. Fear gnawed at him, not fear of death, but fear of somehow failing to save Dean, of losing Dean to Heaven or Hell. There seemed little difference between them now. But for all his anxieties, all his worries, only one thing puzzled him, and he could get no answers from Dean. Since his… _capture_ by Castiel, Dean's thoughts had been subdued, his emotions tightly repressed, and Castiel found it difficult to read his mind from outside the panic room. He could sense Dean's physical presence at the moment, but little else, and Sam had forbidden him from going inside. The youngest Winchester was, perhaps, still displeased with Castiel for his "beat down" of Dean. Castiel could not blame him. He was upset with himself. He knew that he would not again become violent with Dean, that he would not allow his emotions to overcome him a second time, but Sam was less certain and being cautious. Castiel had no obligation to follow Sam's commands, but he saw no particular reason to upset Sam's own emotional balance at the moment. No. If he wanted answers, he would have to question Sam.

With a sigh, Castiel place his splayed hand upon the panic room door. "Dean, I will be upstairs if you need me. Call and I will hear you. You are not alone."

There was no response, but Castiel had expected none. Dean was… he believed the human term was wallowing. The hunter was wallowing in his guilt for starting the apocalypse, for allowing many people to die by refusing to say yes to Michael months ago, for getting Castiel cast out of Heaven, for a variety of sins which no one blamed him for but himself. Sometimes Castiel suspected that Dean would be easier to deal with if he were more selfish and less the righteous man that Heaven and Hell alike had proclaimed him to be. Folding his wings invisibly about him, Castiel side stepped through space, appearing beside Sam in the kitchen upstairs. Used to his coming and going after these many months, the human barely even started. He did, however, look up from the book he had been reading with a kind of desperate focus.

"Is Dean okay?"

"He is quiet. He hasn't tried to escape again."

"Is he still trying to convince you to let him go?"

"No. I believe he now knows that _I _will never say yes."

"And you're liking the irony of that, aren't you?"

Castiel frowned. "I do not _like _anything about this situation." Sam nodded in distressed agreement. Castiel could not read his thoughts at all – a side effect of the demon blood no doubt – but his thoughts were written all over his face and telepathy was hardly necessary. "He will survive this, Sam. We will not allow him to give up his life, and when this is over you will have the pleasure of saying, 'I told you so,' for a change." The younger Winchester huffed out a laugh. It sounded pained to Castiel's developing awareness of human emotion, but the smile Sam fixed on him was grateful and more than a little misty-eyed.

"Thanks, Cas," Sam said. "Thanks for not giving up on us after everything that's happened."

Castiel shifted his wings awkwardly, a nervous twitch which the humans, happily, could not see. Intense human emotion was still uncomfortable for the angel. "Sam," he asked, returning to his reason for leaving Dean's side in the first place. "Why would Dean go to Cicero, Indiana?"

"Cicero? I have no idea. Why?"

"That is where I found him when he went in search of Michael."

"In Cicero? I can't imagine what… unless…" Sam trailed off, his gaze going distant.

"What, Sam?"

The young hunter shook himself, his eyes returning to Castiel's face. "Lisa Braeden lives in Cicero, her and her son Ben. Dean and she had a thing once, and he got pretty freaked out when she and the kid were in danger. That was more than two years ago, and he hasn't even mentioned her since he got back from the basement. I actually wondered if Ben… but Dean swears he's not."

"A thing? You mean a relationship involving sexual intercourse."

"Uh, yeah." Sam flushed, though why a man who'd had an extended affair with a known demon should be embarrassed to admit to a strictly human sexual encounter on his brother's part, Castiel could not understand.

"And this Lisa Braeden, she is a yoga instructor?"

"Yeah, she is. How'd you know?"

Castiel turned bodily away. He did not like to violate Dean's privacy, not when he knew how important it was to him. Yet Sam, if anyone, had a right to know what drove his brother. "She has been much in his thoughts these past weeks."

Sam's eyes widened. "You're reading Dean's thoughts?"

"Not deliberately, but as my powers have waned and as my direct contact with humanity has increased, it has become more difficult to block out the surface thoughts of the humans around me. Especially Dean's." For a several seconds, Castiel was uncertain which revelation Sam would find more significant. In what the angel was coming to regard as typical human fashion, however, he focused on the girl.

"He's been thinking about Lisa… that's… oh man, he's still carrying a torch for – "

As the hunter had spoken, Castiel's feeling of urgency, of something _wrong_ had grown until he could contain it no longer. Wrapping his wings about him, he side-stepped through space once more, leaving while Sam was still verbalizing his own reaction to Dean's unexpectedly powerful feelings for a woman whom he barely knew. Cicero was cold and damp, the air full of the lingering chill of winter. The skies overhead were dark with clouds, blocking much of the noonday sun, and the angel knew that rain would soon fall. The house before him was moderate by American conventions though large by the standards of much of the rest of the world. The neighborhood was quiet on this overcast day, no children or their parents playing in the streets, no one to take note of Castiel's sudden and inexplicable appearance. Still, the place showed signs of ongoing habitation. The yards were tidy, the cars clean, the street free of litter and debris. It was all too clean in that way that made Dean uneasy and which Sam seemed to find pleasing. The word, 'yuppie,' sprang to Castiel's mind, though he was uncertain of its precise meaning. Jimmy would have known, but Jimmy had been utterly silent since Castiel's resurrection and, in truth, the angel suspected that his human host was long gone, that – unable to return to his family for their own safety – he had been allowed the rest he so desperately desired. Jimmy was almost certainly in Heaven. Castiel could imagine him nowhere else.

He folded his wings about him, prepared to enter the house of Lisa Braeden, but some instinct stopped him. She was not a hunter. She was a civilian and a mother. A woman raising a child alone. She would most likely react in a highly negative manner to the unexpected appearance of a strange male inside her home. Resisting the urge to straighten his tie as Dean had once done for him, Castiel walked onto the small porch and knocked on the door. He waited. Twenty-one seconds after his first tap, the door opened. The woman before him matched the woman from Dean's memories. Long dark hair. Dark eyes. A strong jaw. She wore sneakers, blue jeans and a sweatshirt with the logo of a fitness center, Bodies by Braeden, emblazoned across the front. Her eyes were wary, her posture tense as she looked back at him. "Yes? Can I help you?"

He said nothing for a time, merely staring at her intently, reading her surface thoughts. She was alarmed by the quiet stranger who demeanor screamed _not normal_ at her, inflaming all her danger instincts and awakening ten-thousand-year-old fight or flight responses within her. There was also, to Castiel's immense surprise, something in the back of her mind about Dean, something buried deep beneath the surface where he could not quite reach it. He hurried to reassure her.

"Lisa Braeden?" he asked, not because he needed confirmation, but because he knew that she would expect the question.

"Yes." Briefly, the thought had flitted through her mind that he might be a Jehovah's Witness or a Mormon seeking to convert her to his faith, but his slightly rumpled appearance and his knowledge of her name quickly dispelled that notion.

"I am Castiel. I am – " _an angel of the Lord_ " – a friend of Dean Winchester."

Her thoughts become briefly frantic. She thought of Dean openly now, wondering if he was okay, wondering if he was nearby, wondering if he was already dead. Castiel bristled at this last thought. She had reason to believe that Dean was going to die. Clearly, the hunter had visited her, had told her something of his intentions, though just how much Castiel did not know. She felt pulled in two directions, both alarmed by his presence and anxious to speak with him.

"Is he here?" she asked. "Why hasn't he answered my calls? Has something happened to him? What…" She knew she was babbling and stopped, collecting herself. Castiel waited, allowed her time to gather her control anew. It did not take long, though every instant felt like an eternity away from Dean for him now. "Did Dean send you?" she finally asked. "He said he was making arrangements for me and Ben. Are you part of that?"

Castiel contemplated lying, but he needed this woman to trust him. More to the point, in his limited experience of lying, it never ended well. He had lied to Dean, had withheld vital information, and they were now facing an apocalypse in part because of the choices that he had made, and the choices that Sam and Dean had made based on the false information they were given by a supposedly trustworthy ally. It was his greatest sin to his thinking, far worse than his loss of faith in God. Dean and Sam had deserved better from him. God did not. No. He would not lie.

"I am unaware of the arrangement of which you speak. May I enter? There are things you must know."

She hesitated, but the thought that Ben was safely away at school reassured her, and she stepped to the side, gesturing for him to come in.

"Can I get you something to drink," she asked nervously. "I have water, soda or beer if you'd like one."

"No," Castiel could not restrain a small grimace of distaste. "I prefer not to drink alcohol. Thank you."

She sat down on the edge of an armchair, still poised for flight if it proved necessary. Castiel remained standing, though he could see it discomfited her. "Is Dean in some kind of trouble? What's going on? I hadn't even seen him in years and then… those things, on the news. He said things were going to get worse."

"They are going to get much worse if we cannot find a way to stop it," Castiel agreed.

"Stop what?" she demanded.

"It would be far easier for me to show you than to explain. May I?"

"Show me what?"

Castiel knew that her question was not really an assent, but they had so little time. If he could learn of her acute importance to Dean, if he could find her so easily, then so could others on either side of the conflict. Reaching out, he placed his whole hand on the side of her face before she could draw back. She breathed in sharply, convulsed, and he caught her as she fell.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

"Show me what?"

Castiel knew that her question was not really an assent, but they had so little time. If he could learn of her acute importance to Dean, if he could find her so easily, then so could others on either side of the conflict. Reaching out, he placed his whole hand on the side of her face before she could draw back. She breathed in sharply, convulsed, and he caught her as she fell. Carefully, so very carefully, he opened up his own mind to her, sharing his memories one by precious one, every memory he possessed of Dean Winchester from the first moment he had seen the Righteous Man in Hell, tormented and in agony, to his confrontation with Dean in an alley in Cicero. He held nothing back, censored nothing, knowing she would experience not only his memories of those events, but the emotions that went with them. It left him feeling… vulnerable, terribly exposed. It was a kind of intimacy he had shared only with other angels and then only in a very limited way. Soul mates existed among his brethren just as they did among humans. For angelic soul mates, such close connection of minds and hearts, the joining of their very graces, was a thing of joy. Castiel had no such bond with any angel, and the only human he felt something approaching that level of closeness for was, at that very moment, locked in an iron room, determined to end his own existence. And this woman, this ignorant human, was an utter stranger to him. The risk was great for them both, and he guided her consciousness through the joining as gently and deftly as he could. He guarded only his thoughts, for to let her see the actual thoughts of an angel, the inner workings of an angelic mind could destroy her fragile human brain as easily as letting Pamela Barnes glimpse his true form had destroyed the psychic's eyes. He still regretted that… accident, though he had done what he could to warn her not to pry.

Castiel quivered with the effort at concentration. He kept tight control, rigidly maintaining his power over their union of memory, trying to direct all that happened. He was not entirely successful. With an angel, the joining would have been effortless. With a human it was taxing, exhausting, even painful. It was also not what he would have expected in any way. He had known that the woman would receive his memories. That was, after all, his intent. He had not suspected that he would also be gifted – or perhaps burdened – with hers. They came at him in rapid flashes, strangely dim and muted compared to his own diamond-sharp recollections. An angel's memories did not fade or alter themselves over time. It seemed that for a human, this was not the case. Lisa Braeden's memories of the last three years were filled with tremendous gaps. Even those that were the strongest were missing key details, entire senses occasionally absent. Her memories of her encounter with the changelings were vivid, strong with the ripe scent of fear and an overwhelming sense of despair in the moment when she realized that the creature before her was not her son.

Her memories of Dean, especially of her first meeting with him, were also powerful and, to Castiel, far more disturbing. Meeting the prostitute Chastity had stirred unexpected sensations within him. Desire, _sexual_ desire was a wholly new experience for the angel. Yet the feelings Chastity had awakened within him were mild, meek things at best. The sensations he experienced through Lisa Braeden's memories were vibrant, potent and all-encompassing. She had desired Dean powerfully when they'd met for the first time, immediately enamored of his smile, his brilliant eyes, his slightly bow legs and taut – Castiel concentrated, cutting the memory off, tucking it away for later examination. He could not afford to be distracted now, when so much depended on his absolute focus and control. Dealing with her more mundane memories was troublesome enough for humans lacked certain senses that even the lowliest angel took for granted, and those senses that humans did possess were far inferior. Castiel had never before realized just _how_ inferior. The differences in sight alone were appalling, and the angel found it problematic to reconcile Lisa Braeden's view of the world with his own. Humans saw so little of what was around them every moment of every day. How did they bear it?

The longer the transfer – no, the sharing went on, the more excruciating and demanding it became, but Castiel gritted his teeth and persevered until the human could claim his every last recollection of Dean Winchester as her own. When the joining was completed, he staggered back, arm falling to his side, wings drooping with exhaustion. Lisa Braeden no longer convulsed, but sagged limp and still into the cushions of the armchair. It had been simplest to accomplish his goal with her asleep, but he would not know if he had been truly successful in his endeavors until he woke her. He took a few moments to compose himself first. He layered wall upon wall in his mind, closing off his own memories from those of the human lest he be overwhelmed as she had been. Then, at last satisfied that he could function, that the unnerving human memories were properly shut away, the angel took a step forward, reached once more for Lisa Braeden's face and promptly collapsed. As his legs folded beneath him, he had time for only one thought, a word he had never before uttered aloud but which more than adequately expressed his current consternation. Crap…

When Castiel regaining consciousness of his surroundings – he could not call it waking for he had not been asleep as humans knew that state – he found himself lying on his back upon a cool upholstered surface. He came instantly to full awareness but was disturbed to find that he did not know how much time had passed. That was another thing which had never happened to him before. Twice before he had collapsed in the Winchesters' presence because of the ill effects of time travel. Though he had been largely unaware when Sam and Dean had left him in the hotel room in Lawrence in 1978, he had never completely lost his sense of time passing. The same had been the case when he returned to the present time and again collapsed. When he was attacked by the Whore of Babylon, he was weakened and damaged, but he maintained knowledge of what transpired. Even when he died, when Rafael smote him and reduced him to particles so small that humans could not yet conceive of them, even then he had not lost his sense of time passing. Well… perhaps he had. But when he was miraculously restored, he had been remade with all of his senses intact and at their peak. He had known exactly how much time had passed since his death at the archangel's hands, had known exactly where he was, had known everything that had transpired with Sam and Dean while he was gone and, mostly importantly, he had known exactly where he needed to go. He regretted the deaths of the angels he'd been forced to kill, but given the same circumstances, he would do it again. It was only a pity that Zachariah could not have died in his followers' place. But now… now his sense of time was broken. He could mark every moment he had lived back to the beginning of his creation, say exactly where he was and what he was doing for every instant of his existence until this one. Clearly, the joining between humans and angels was far more dangerous and had far greater consequences than even he had supposed.

And his coat – Jimmy's coat – had been removed. He found that… oddly disquieting and did not know why. Angels did not care about clothing. He sighed. He wanted his coat, but was not yet ready to go looking for it. He had lain still for a time, simply breathing, trying to reestablish some semblance of calm when a voice startled him.

"Cas, are you alright?" It was Lisa Braeden. She was leaning over the back of the sofa, peering down at him anxiously. "You dropped like a drunk with a glass jaw."

"I am not an alcoholic," Castiel corrected, sitting up gingerly, his arms trembling with the movement. "The joining – the transfer of so much personal experience weakened me enormously, but I will recover."

She sighed. "Good. That's good." She walked around the edge of the sofa and dropped a black nylon duffel bag beside the front door. A backpack, a large suitcase and a second duffel were already piled together there. They had not been there _before._ Clearly, he had been unconscious for some extended period of time. People marked time carefully. Clocks in all shapes and sizes were everything in the human world. She would know how long. He would ask her.

"You called me Cas?" he said instead, surprising himself.

"That's what Dean calls you, right?"

"It is."

Lisa Braeden – Lisa, Lissie, Lis-Be, Pooka_? There _were so many names in his mind. – stared at him solemnly. "You're an angel," she said. It was not a question, but he answered nonetheless.

"Yes."

"You're Dean's angel?" she clarified.

Castiel felt a moment of irritation. He belonged to no one. He certainly did not belong to Dean. And yet… "He is my friend."

Lisa nodded. "The apocalypse, those things I've seen on TV, the weird stuff I'm reading online… it's all real?"

"Yes. All of it."

She swallowed. Turned away. Turned back. Her eyes were brimming with tears that did not quite overflow. "And Dean? He died and he… he went to Hell?"

Castiel nodded, relieved. The joining had worked to some extent at least, for she clearly had many of his memories. He sought her mind, sought to read her thoughts and found, to his dismay, that they were now closed to him. Whether it was a temporary response to his own incapacity or a more permanent change in the structure of her mind, he did not know.

"You saved him." Again it was not a question.

He inclined his head and regarded her gravely. "I was but one of those sent to rescue the Righteous Man, as you must now know."

"No," she shook her head. "It was you. To the others, it was just a mission. You felt more. Even then, you sensed something… wrong." Taking five quick steps, Lisa stopped in front of the sofa, leaned down and kissed him quickly on the cheek. "Thank you."

"For saving Dean?"

She smiled, her dark eyes sparkling with wry humor and intense emotion. "For maybe saving all of us."


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

Lisa moved away and Castiel watched with interest as she disappeared up the carpeted stairs and then reappeared with yet another bag, this one a blue duffel that also had "Bodies by Braeden" written on it in bright letters. "What are you doing?" he asked.

"Packing to get the hell out of here. The minute Ben gets back from school, we're gone."

Castiel sighed. "That is probably wise. If I can find you, so can others. It isn't safe to remain here much longer."

Lisa humphed. "No kidding."

Castiel continued to observe quietly as she double-checked the luggage, finally dropping her purse onto the top of the pile. She moved quickly, determined and focused on her actions but with little evidence of either panic or hysteria in her manner. She stopped and looked out the window, peering between the curtains, clearly watching for her son. "Where will you go?"

Lisa spun around, her eyebrows climbing as she stared at him open-mouthed. "Don't be ridiculous. We're going with you."

Castiel gazed back at her curiously. "That is unwise. You should go somewhere Dean has never been. Go somewhere you have never been, somewhere no one would ever thing to look for you."

"No. We're coming with you and that's final."

"Why?" he asked, perplexed by her vehemence.

"You have to ask?" He said nothing, fairly certain after the time he'd spent with Dean and Sam that the question had to be rhetorical. He simply continued to stare at her until she explained herself. Sighing in exasperation, Lisa turned back to the window, speaking to him without looking at him. "Negotiating the Apocalypse with hunters as backup has to be easier than negotiating it without hunters as backup. That would be reason enough alone. Besides, the safest place to be in a fight between two giant monsters is directly behind one of the giant monsters – any kid who ever watched Saturday morning matinees can tell you that. I don't like hiding, I don't like running away, and I sure as spit don't like running out on my friends."

"We are not your friends," Castiel noted quite seriously.

"No," she agreed. "You're just the angel trying to save the world from Heaven. Bobby's just the old cripple trying to save the world from Hell. Sam is just the guy who helped saved my son's life. And Dean is…" She trailed off, fingering the edge of the drapes absently. Then, giving herself a small shake, she turned and dug in her purse. "I have to make a few calls. Wait here." That said, she walked through the kitchen archway and disappeared from view. Castiel sat and considered things. She was, difficult as it was to fathom, even bossier than Dean. Clearly, Lisa was a woman used to giving orders and having those orders obeyed. She might have made a fine angel, provided that she were put in charge of a garrison rather than simply stationed in one.

Castiel could feel his strength returning, though it crept back with frustrating slowness. Looking about, he spotted his coat lying across the back of a chair. It took him an embarrassingly long time to determine precisely how to get back into the strange article of clothing, but he felt unaccountably better once it was back in place. He resumed his perch on the edge of Lisa's sofa and waited. Periodically, snatches of her voice would reach his ears from elsewhere in the house, and he presumed that she was completing her calls. She still had her cellphone pressed to her ear when she reentered the room sometime later. " – don't know when I'll be back." She paused, and the angel could clearly hear the sound of another woman speaking on the other end of the line.

"But Lisa, if you can't tell me how long you'll be away, I'll have to get more than a sub. You might not be able to get your classes back. It's not like you own the gym anymore, and – "

"Look, Jen, it's fine. Find a replacement. I'm sorry about the short notice, but you knew I was going to be moving on eventually anyway."

"I guess, but – "

"Got to go. Bye, Jen." Lisa hung up with a decisive snap of the cell phone. When she saw Castiel watching her, she said, "New manager. She's not happy that I'm bailing after I promised that I'd stick around and keep teaching classes for at least six months after the sale, but it was just a handshake deal, so she can't really do anything about it."

"A handshake deal?" he asked curiously.

"Just a verbal promise, not actually part of the contract from the sale."

"What is a – " _gym_? He started to ask the question, but broke off as one of Lisa memories, one fairly devoid of strong emotional content, slipped through the walls he'd constructed around her memories in his mind. She was standing before a wall of mirrors in a brightly light space. Her back was to the mirrors and a group of women wearing – _leotards?_ – stood facing her, their limbs moving to match Lisa's as she assumed a pose that looked contorted and uncomfortable to the angel. So, he thought, that is yoga.

"I feel bad about leaving my students in the lurch, but I only had two weeks left on the deal, and I don't like the way the new chain is running my gym anyway. I've got a feeling that my best clients are going to wind up looking for a new workout place pretty darn fast." She sighed. "Of course, that's only if any of us survive the Apocalypse, so it's not high on my worry list right now."

"Yes, the Apocalypse. Lisa, that's why I came here. Dean is very important to each side in the coming battle – "

"I'd kind of picked up on that."

" – and Heaven and Hell alike will do whatever it takes to bend him to their will. That makes you and Ben both likely targets for attack. You must be cautious and you must be protected for Dean's sake as well as your own."

"And we both know which of those is the most important to you," she said.

"Lisa, I – "

"No. No, it's okay. I'm just being bitchy. Even from just the little I've been able to absorb, I can see that Dean means a lot to you. You were telling the truth when you said that he was your friend, but it's more than that. I can tell. Frankly, the fact that you and Dean are so close just makes me trust you more. You'll never do anything to hurt him, and that means you won't deliberately hurt us."

Castiel found himself flushing as he remembered exactly what had happened when he tracked Dean to this very city a mere two days earlier. "I have hurt him," he said, aware that she would almost certainly be able to hear the self-reproach in his voice.

Lisa waved a hand dismissively. "I mean really hurt him, not just banging him around a little when he drives you to the brink of Endurance and then kicks you over the city limit line."

"I don't understand what that means."

"Oh, right," she said, looking… he believed the emotion was chagrined. "I know that drives you crazy when Dean does it. It just means that you have a right to be pissed off and that Dean, as the one who pissed you off, had it coming. Anyway, it's not like you lost your temper with some little old guy in a walker and an oxygen tank. Dean's the kind of guy who gets into bar brawls for the fun of it. He wrestles monsters on a regular basis. The way you _expressed_ your displeasure was a little strong, but it wasn't totally out of proportion given the provocation. From what I saw, Dean could try the patience of a saint, let alone an angel. Besides, you think I'm not going to have a few things to say to him when I see him?"

Judging by her expression, the things she had to say would not be pleasant. "So you are determined to return with me to Bobby's house?"

"I am," she said firmly.

"Then we should waste no further time preparing you." So saying, Castiel stood and approached the human woman purposefully. Her eyes widened in apprehension as he neared, but she didn't draw away. Instead she braced herself, scrunching up her eyes and clenching her jaw as if prepared for a blow, but one that she knew was necessary. Castiel placed his hand on her breastbone and inscribed the Enochian sigil that would hide her from the sight of all angels, including him. He could do nothing about demons for the moment, but Sam could provide her with an appropriate hex bag once they reached Bobby's. As the sigil carved itself into her ribs, Lisa gasped and then recoiled the instant that the spell released her.

"Ow, ow, ow, ow! Son of a bitch, that hurts! I mean, I knew it would be painful because I remember you doing it to Dean, but ouch!" Castiel raised his eyebrows disdainfully. Sam and Dean had not made such a fuss. Perhaps, because she was woman it was different. "Shut up!" she snapped, apparently reading his thoughts correctly in his expression. "Are you going to do that to Ben?" she demanded anxiously.

"I cannot. He is still growing. The sigil wouldn't harm him, but it would quickly become ineffective as his body changes, and once it has been made, it cannot be remade."

"So how do we hide him?"

"I must give the matter some thought. I can mark his clothing, but such a measure could be unreliable. Perhaps you should send him elsewhere, to a friend or relative."

Lisa looked toward the window, troubled as any mother should be at the thought of danger to her child. She tensed, then turned back to him, a decisive expression in her eyes. "These people, without the sigil, they'll be able to find Ben no matter where he is. Right?"

"Yes."

"Then he stays with us. If they're going to find him, I'd rather he was with us than with his Great Aunt Cornelia."

Us. They had only just met, and yet she already spoke of them as an _us._ Humans were beings given to violent emotions and quick changes of mood. They made decisions in an instant that an angel might deliberate upon for weeks, months, even years. But this… this was an unbelievably rapid change even by human standards.

"I know this is all sudden," Lisa said, "but I don't see how wringing my hands and waffling back and forth about all of this will make any difference. I know what's happening now, and I know what's at stake. For better or worse, Ben and I are part of this, so we cowboy up." Again, the human woman seemed to know what he was thinking with startling accuracy, and Castiel found himself wondering just what sort of lasting impact the sharing of so much memory would have on her… and on him. "Besides," Lisa added in afterthought that nevertheless got right to the heart of the matter, "I'll be damned if I'm going to let Michael have Dean without a fight."


End file.
